Who Knows
by emoly01
Summary: The innocent little object had once been quite soft and adorable.


The innocent little object had once been quite soft and adorable. Now, the old abused teddy bear sat with matted and burnt brown fur, one black beady eye missing its partner, and as many tears as it did sad moments in its history. It had exactly two and a half limbs, missing half an arm and an entire leg on either side. Perhaps the saddest part, however, was the dust that had collected on its nose and ears, one of which was half torn off.

Seeing it surprised Ed, so he picked it up. After all, helping Roy move from this tiny house to a larger one was a monotonous job. Everything was supposed to be boxes and boxes and bins. One lone, untouched teddy bear who had seen awful days in the corner of the attic was not something he'd expected. Either Roy hadn't seen it when packing all the boxes, or he hadn't thought someone would go up the attic before him. There weren't many boxes up there - just two labeled "journals," and another labeled, "photos."

Ed was jarred out of his examination of the bear when Roy called up the stairs. "Ed? Are you up there? I told you I'd get those boxes." The stairs squeaked, and Ed raised a blond eyebrow at Roy's head emerging through the hole in the attic floor. He held up the bear. Roy raised both of his eyebrows, but not at the bear. "Didn't you hear me? I said I'm getting these boxes."

Ed didn't receive a response by presenting the dying bear, so he decided to verbally draw attention to it. "What the fuck is this?"

Roy blinked and replied deadpan, "A bear, Edward. I thought you'd be able to recognize one." Frustration turned Ed's face red, but Roy cut off his sharp remark. "I'll get these boxes. Go help Havoc in the living room." Ed scowled. Not only was he denied refute to Roy's jab at his intelligence, but Roy wasn't even reacting to the fucking bear.

"Why do you have a bear in your attic collecting dust?" Persistence would get an answer.

"Go help with the boxes."

"Well if you care so little about it, I'm taking it."

Roy's expression turned hard. "Ed. Don't be childish. That's mine."

Ed smirked. "I don't want to hear from you that I'm childish. You still own a teddy bear."

"Yes, I cuddle with it and suck on my thumb. Happy? Put it down and go."

"I want to know why you still have it."

Roy rolled his eyes impatiently. Ed was insufferable. "I just never threw it out."

"So why is it all burned and torn apart?"

"It's just old, Ed. Put it down," Roy demanded. He was getting sick of this.

"What, it's old so it spontaneously combusted? Did you use it as target practice? Jeez, look at it." Ed rotated the abused thing in his hands, shaking his head. "What the fuck is with this?" He looked up sharply as Roy finished the climb up the stairs into the attic. He held out a pale hand.

"Give it and go."

"'Gimme, gimme' never gets." And then Ed stuck out his tongue.

Roy closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to calm himself before he burnt Ed to a crisp, along with the bear and the house. That would be a financial disaster. The thought calmed him somewhat and he dropped both of his hands. "What do you want, Ed? To humiliate me? Fine. Say it. I'm a child, I'm not fit for Fuhrerhood, whatever."

Ed scowled. "All of that is true, but that's not what I want." Roy almost lost his temper, but Ed kept talking. "I just want to fucking know what happened to the fucking bear."

And Roy gave in with a sigh. "It was a Christmas present. I accidentally burned it a couple times, so I put it up in the attic where it's safe."

Ed seemed nonplussed. "That explains nothing. Why would you want to keep it safe? Why not just throw it out or give it away while it was still in decent condition? How did it lose its limbs?"

"Look," Roy insisted, his exasperated tone beginning to show the wrinkles in his face, "the boxes aren't going to move themselves. Put that thing down and I'll explain it to you later." Ed rolled his eyes, muttered under his breath, and went back downstairs where he would tell everyone on the team about the mutilated bear and Roy's avoidance. Roy glanced down at the miserable artifact that Ed had dropped carelessly, and bent over to pick it up.

He remembered the first time he picked it up.

_All the rain and hail for the past three days couldn't do anything to stop the blazing house from blazing hard and quick. Roy had been standing outside, watching the smoke climb and the flames lick the rain, ignorant to the cold, to his scorched and soaked clothes, to the hail pelting his face and shoulders. When the first police officers had arrived, they had sat him down in their car and thrown a blanket over his shoulders._

_When the fires finally went out, Roy still sat, dazed._

_When the firemen said it was safe, he trudged past all the busy police officers who tried to ask him questions and hold him back. They didn't try for very long; his rank intimidated them. He stepped into the ashes, consumed by thoughts of the house that had been standing erect only a day ago. He kicked something crunchy and looked down to see the little girl's mutilated scorched corpse, her hand reaching for the bear only inches away._

He bent over to pick it up.

Shaking himself out of reminiscence, Roy gently squeezed the bear.


End file.
